Guest Editor: LM on Playing pickup games with WFB 3rd edition

Hi everyone! Here are some thoughts by my regular gaming opponent LM about pickup games. Enjoy and be sure to check out his wondelful models @flankingmaneuvers 

Playing pickup games with WFB 3rd edition

In my opinion Warhammer Fantasy Battle 3^rd edition is best enjoyed playing pre-made scenarios with an Umpire, but sometimes you just want to design your own army list for a points-based game with your opponent. Here are some general thoughts and house rules on how we do it.

 

Army Selection

We’ve been playing games mainly at 3000 points which seems to give you enough room to field some of the more interesting units, but it still forces choice in which units you leave home. Other than magic (see below) we’ve used the lists from Warhammer Armies as printed.

 

The army lists have worked fine, but it must be noted that nobody’s been really trying to break the system and we like to change our army composition from game to game. Undoubtedly we could’ve found min-maxed killer armies had we wanted to.

 

Magic

Although wizards are quite pricy and their magic points are limited, we’ve decided to limit the maximum spell level to 3. We also reroll the following spells: B2.14 Vortex of Chaos and B3.15 Vorpal Hurricane of Chaos. Maybe the vortex spells are not too strong in a big game, but we don’t like how they affect the game.

 

Terrain

The table system given in the Advanced Rules section of the rulebook is fun if you have the time to do it and I’d recommend trying it out atleast once. But to be honest usually we just throw something interesting on the table and dice for table edges.

 

Deployment Rules

The same goes for the deployment rules in the Advanced Rules section. Fun every once in while if you have the time.

 

Game Length

Games are played until one (or both!) of the armies are broken (see below).

 

Army break-point

We play our games until one of the armies reaches 50% of their units dead or routing. We calculate this as full units and add characters separately to the total. So for example, in a 3000 point game, 1500 points of forces dead/routing will cause an army to break and the game to end.

 

We finish the game at the end of a player turn, so theoretically it is possible for both armies to break at the same time and the game could end up in a draw.

 

For a shorter or a longer game the break point could be set at some other level. For example, a quick 2000 point game could end at the loss of 750 points.

 

Baggage

Since we’re not playing with Victory Points as per rulebook, we decided to add a new incentive into fielding a baggage train. For an army that brings a baggage on to the battlefield, a 5% bonus is added to their break-point. But if the baggage is lost, it counts as a loss double its value!

 

 

Table size

While a 3000 game will fit on a 6x4’ table, we’ve found that a 8x4’ table gives more opportunities for cavalry and skirmishers to use their advantages and flank marches will not be as accurate. For a 2000 point game, 6x4’ seems to be fine.

 

Conclusion

The main motivation for this article was to write down what we’ve been doing for the past 5 or so years. Maybe it is of interest to other oldhammerers still playing with the orange rulebook! I would also be interested in hearing how others organize their games of WFB3.